Israel and Gaza

Who will sit in judgment?

The politics and diplomacy of the inquiry into last week’s deaths of nine Turkish activists

Jerusalem

THE Israeli government is haggling with the United States and Europe over the terms and composition of a commission of inquiry that it proposes to set up to investigate its lethal storming on May 31st of a Turkish ship bringing aid to Gaza. At the same time, in close co-ordination with Egypt, Israel is offering to ease the blockade of Gaza, drastically reducing the list of goods it refuses to let into the territory.

These measures, the Israeli government believes, may stem the wave of international opprobrium that swept over the Jewish state following the ship incident, in which nine Turkish civilians died. The Israeli prime minister, Binyamin Netanyahu, has told his ministers and senior officials to refrain from any public response to the blistering verbal attacks being made by Turkey’s prime minister, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, and members of his government. The two countries, close allies for many years, still have important defence ties that Israel hopes to preserve despite the present crisis.

The Israeli army has already commissioned its own internal inquiry, headed by a retired general, Giora Eiland. Although public opinion at home largely rallied behind the armed forces, many Israelis have criticised the failure to anticipate violent resistance aboard the Mavi Marmara, the largest vessel in a six-ship flotilla carrying peace campaigners and pro-Palestinian activists. Israeli commandos dropped from helicopters, firing paintballs, and were apparently set upon by activists wielding clubs and knives. According to the Israelis, this forced the commandos to open fire.

Mr Netanyahu has suggested that an inquiry commission comprising Israeli experts in international law could be joined by American and European observers. The prime minister and his minister of defence, Ehud Barak, would appear before this commission and answer its questions.

His own suggested nominees, however, were two retired diplomats, one with outspoken right-wing views, and a professor of international law who is angling to be appointed—with Mr Netanyahu’s approval—as Israel’s ambassador to the UN. The Israeli prime minister also made it clear that serving soldiers and officers would not be allowed to give evidence before the commission. It would rely on the findings of the army’s inquiry board.

The commission’s ambit, in Mr Netanyahu’s blueprint, would also focus purely on whether the blockade of Gaza and the seizure of the peace flotilla were legal. The broader questions of the wisdom and morality of the assault would be beyond its mandate. The Americans reportedly want more international participation on the commission and a heavier-weight Israeli to chair it to give it greater credibility.

But both Israel and America want to avoid a repeat of the controversial UN report issued in September by Richard Goldstone, a South African judge, which accused Israel and Hamas, the Islamist group that runs the Gaza Strip, of war crimes during Israel’s three-week attack on Gaza which began in December 2008. On June 2nd the Geneva-based UN Human Rights Council, which initiated the Goldstone inquiry, voted “to dispatch an independent international fact-finding mission to investigate violations of international law, including international humanitarian aid and human rights law”. But the council has a long history of criticising Israel and America and several European countries opposed the resolution.

Israel, meanwhile, has remained notably silent about Egypt’s decision last week to open the crossing between Gaza and Sinai at Rafah and its follow-up announcement on June 7th that the border would remain open indefinitely. The blockade of the Gaza Strip, which has been in place since Hamas took power in 2007, has been enforced by Israel and Egypt, acting separately, with the initial endorsement of America and the European Union.

A busy network of tunnels running under Rafah has, in any event, made a mockery of the Egyptian effort. But Egypt has been building an iron barrier, sunk deep into the sandy soil, to thwart this subterranean traffic. It is supposed to be finished by August. Israel for its part has been praising Egypt of late for the meticulous nature of its measures to ensure that missiles and other weapons do not flow into the strip.

Although Israel indicates that it will now substantially ease the flow of goods across its own land-crossings into Gaza, its officials say there will be no let-up in the sea blockade. One ship, they explain, can bring in more weapons than a fleet of lorries with hidden military hardware.